Fan Community Nicknames

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Many fanbases on TV have their own nicknames. Some are generated by themselves, some from observers and some from detractors.

Be advised when using these terms that by the time the name becomes well known to outsiders, it's often gathered some distaste by those within the fandom. "Trekkie" has reached universal status and even appears in reputable dictionaries, but many within Star Trek fandom only ever use the term derisively, preferring the term "Trekker". Likewise, "Whovian" comes primarily from US Public Television — it was originated by, and for some time a trademark of, the Doctor Who Fan Club of America — and many fans outside the US think it sounds a bit silly, preferring the considerably more baroque but less jargonish "fans of the programme".

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Examples:

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Anime & Manga

Otaku, in the western sense which only refers to being a fan of anime or manga. There's also "weeaboo", which was originally meant to refer to Japanophilia to the extent that they praise Japanese as the Master Race and despise their original Western heritage, but in fact they only learned Japanese culture from watching anime and often end up using romanized Japanese words (e.g. "kawaii") in English context when that would not be necessary at all thus ending up looking pretentious. People now use it as a term of general derision against anyone who likes anything Japanese, or Asian at all, whether or not they actually look down on anything western - for this reason, some people regard it as a racist term.

Attack on Titan: The Funimation-sponsored cosplay group that met at Anime Expo 2013 used the term 'Troops'; whether this is widely accepted and used remains to be seen.

X-no-Miko (Fushigi Yuugi; this is applicable to individual characters only, such as "Tamahome no Miko", "Hotohori no Miko", "Tasuki no Miko", etc.) Some of the more neutral fan groups refer to themselves as Seishi and assign counterparts in each group for each character.

Berserk: Berserkers; also occasionally used are Apostle Spawn, The Godfans and The Fans Of The Hawk (the latter two in reference to, respectively, the Godhand and the Band of the Hawk). "Strugglers" is also common, with fans joking about struggling against the author's frequent hiatuses.

Ben Hutchins, while writing Undocumented Features, wrote that the forums for his work had the patience of "rabid crack weasels". He sometimes regrets having done this, as they've taken the name as their own, even having shirts and hats made for it.

Fans of Glee fanfic writer Caitlin (also known as "Keitorin Asthore" or "redbullandcupcake batter") refer to themselves as "Cake Pops". They also refer to Caitlin herself as "Mama Cake Pop".

Another example of the Glee fandom, CP Coulter (author of the famous fic Dalton has a fandom called "The Coult", its members "Coults". Coulter is commonly called Mama CP or CP Trollter, the latter due to her infamous Trolling Creator tendencies.

The Velvet Key was called "Fate/Persona" derisively by people outside the game who disapproved of the large Nasuverse cast, which at the time took up half the game. This became an Insult Backfire as the cast started calling themselves that proudly.

Fandalorians, specifically for fans of Boba Fett and the Mandalorians in general.

In the movie Fanboys, the Trekkies refer to them as "Staroids" in a disrespectful manner.

Additionally, fans of the Empire are often called the 501st Legion, after Vader's personal army (the largest Star Warscosplay community actually uses this name). The 501st Legion even has an official website and Facebook page.

Due to some unfortunate behavior from some of the Star Wars Fandom's Vocal Minority, "Ku Klux Klan" is starting to gain steam.

Harry Potter has Potterheads. Also known as Potterites. Pottheads, for a more pejorative term. Also "Potterphile". Non-fans are known as Muggles or "Mudbloods".

Another common name is Dumbledore's Army or the D.A.

Harmonians for the infamously vocal Harry/Hermione shippers

Herons for their arch-enemies, the Ron/Hermione shippers.

"Good Shippers" (from "The Good Ship Ron/Hermione") seems to be more common than "Herons".

Puppyshippers for those shipping Sirius/Remus.

One Big Happy Weasley Family (OBHWF) for anyone who supports the canon ships for the main characters.

It's also quite common for fans to declare allegiance to Hogwarts houses, referring to themselves by the name of the House whose values they believe that they embody most. Many fans are much more likely to call themselves "Gryffindors", "Slytherins", "Ravenclaws" or "Hufflepuffs" than they are to call themselves by any other blanket fandom nickname.

The Lord of the Rings: "Ringers" (pejoratively "Ringnuts") is used mostly by fans of the movies. Book fans call themselves "Tolkienites" and Tolkien language nerds use Tolkiendil (pl. Tolkiendili): -(n)dil is a Quenya (Elvish) suffix roughly equivalent to -phile.

Hard Core Fan Freaks for those devoted to following Robert Jordan's massive The Wheel of Time series. These are also known as Randlanders, as the world is often referred to as Randland, which again comes from the name of main character Rand al'Thor

Phagers for members of the Gone fansite Gaiaphage.com, and Fayzians for fans of the series itself. That being said, most Fayzians are members of Gaiaphage, so the terms overlap a lot.

Not used often, but several fans of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series have referred to themselves as "Tower Junkies" based on an offhand(and completely spot-on) comment about Roland made by Eddie Dean in "The Drawing Of The Three".

The major The Hunger Games fansites had a poll for fans to select their own fandom nickname. "Tributes" won narrowly over "Mockingjays."

Fans of Philip José Farmer's Wold Newton Family refer to themselves as "Meteorics" - a name inspired by the Wold Newton meteor strike that mutated the members of the Family.

"Afpers" for Discworld fans who are on the Usenet group alt.fan.pratchett. Discworld fans also sometimes call themselves "Loonies", because that's what Sir Terry called them. He meant it affectionately. We think.

Fans of His Dark Materials who inhabit the Bridge To The Stars website style themselves Sraffies.

Divergent has an interesting case in which the fans refer to themselves by whichever faction in the books they identify themselves with. (Dauntless, Erudite, Amity, Abnegation, Candor). However, sometimes "Factionless" is used as a general term for all of them, based off the name of one of the fansites. The common overall term is "Initiates".

The Mortal Instruments fandom has taken for itself the name of the half-angel demon hunters around whom the books revolve, the Shadowhunters.

Fans of Red Rising are known as Howlers. The fandom as a whole is collectively referred to as the Howler Legion.

Live-Action TV

The American Idol forums make fan clubs for each contestant, each with their own unique name, which can range from simply being based on the contestant's name ("Arch Angels" or "Archies" for David Archuleta, "Gokey Gang" for Danny Gokey, "Anoop Troop" for Anoop Desai, etc.) to a reference to a prominent feature (fans of the dreadlocked contestant Jason Castro called themselves "Dreadheads") to the more arcane (after David Cook called himself a "word nerd" in reference to his love of crossword puzzles in an early interview, his fan group christened themselves the Word Nerds), to the just plain weird (Ramiele Malubay was small, cute, Asian, and had a powerful voice—so the fan group decided to christen themselves the "Pikachu Posse".) Big Brother fans do the same.

Clone Club (Orphan Black). Queer female fans are called "clonesbians".

Colbert Nation for fans of The Colbert Report. Stephen regularly refers to them as such, and it's the show's url as well (it was formerly a "fansite" created by the show's writers)! "Heroes" and "It-Getters" are used as well, which have slightly different connotations. Unique in that all these names were given to the fans by Colbert in the first episode, and stuck.

Pushing Daisies fans have been known in some parts to argue over whether "Daisy-Pushers" or "Pie Hos" would be a preferential fan community nickname. (When deciding, as the mention of this conflict will most assuredly have you doing, please note the negative connotations of "Pie Hos".)

The "Peanut Gallery" for any and all incarnations of The Howdy Doody Show. "Buffalo Bob" Smith sometimes even refers to the audience members as "peanuts".

Fans of The Price Is Right on the site Golden-Road.net chime in on broadcast recaps using cutesy nicknames for the show's pricing games ("Clocky" for Clock Game, "Baggy" for It's in ihe Bag, "Cliffy" for Cliffhangers, etc.).

Though that's becoming very rare. They now mostly refer to themselves as "Cumberbabes", since Benedict himself disliked their previous nickname. The adjective to describe such a person is "Ben-addicted" or "Cumberbatched". Another one is "Cumbercookie", since they are all Cumbercookies and together they make this beautiful Cumberbatch.

The term has regained popularity since Sherlock hit the United States.

Sherlockians has become popular for fans of the show and not just Benedict in particular. Although it's also used by fans of the books.

Sandra Lee haters on Television Without Pity call themselves "shrikes." The name "shrike" came about when a Sandra Lee defender commented on an article about Sandra Lee and called her detractors "shrikes." Conversely, her fans are referred to as "Fandras."

While there isn't one for the fandom as a whole, the Game of Thrones community on Television Without Pity is divided between the Unsullied (those who have not read the books), and the Bookwalkers (those who have read the books). Unlike most divisions among fandoms, this one is quite amiable, aside from resentment among the Unsullied for when Bookwalkers drop spoilers.

Saban has also used the terms Super Fans and Ranger Nation, referring to the Periphery Demographic adult fanbase as a whole. Neither were popular with the fandom however, and Ranger Nation is already the name for the fans of the New York Rangers NHL team.

Fans of Once Upon a Time call themselves "Oncers." There are quite a few nicknames for different subfandoms of them, too:

Mouseketeers (All versions of The Mickey Mouse Club)note It's the also the name of the actual performers on the show, with Roy Williams in the original 1950s version calling himself the "Big Mooseketeer".

The Mickey Mouse Club (after the show) for fans of Mickey himself (as well as the aforementioned "Mouseketeers").

X Campers (X Company), used since the first season by fans, after the real life Canadian secret spy camp of World War II that inspired the series

Zooberoos (Zoobilee Zoo, used by Mayor Ben; not to be confused with "Zoobles", which refers to the characters)

Turncoats (Turn), a portmanteau of the words turn and coat (the former being the series title, now Turn: Washington's Spies,, and the latter for the coats worn during the times of the American Revolution, where the series is set)

Kimbits (Kim's Convenience) which combines the surname of the sitcom's main family with the popular Tim Hortons donut hole product Timbits for an extra dose of Canada, Eh?.

The Family has also been used since the release of Nightmare and the single "Welcome to the Family"

Others have favoured the term "Deathbats" (in reference to the band's logo) in order to avoid confusion with the otherAvengers.

BABYMETAL: individually Kitsune; collectively The One, which is also the name of the official fan club.

Bachman-Turner Overdrive: Gearheads

Band-Maid: The band calls their fans Goshujin-sama and Ojou-sama, or "Master" and "Princess"note ("Lady" might be a more suitable translation in this context, but there you go.) when on world tour, in keeping with their Meido theme and namesake.

Bloc Party: Marshall (if you liked the band before their first album) or Pioneer (if you liked them after they released it). This used to refer to their paid membership on their old website. Some even call themselves Weekenders after AWITC.

EXO: Exo-L (or Aeri/Eri, which has the meaning of guardian and blessing in Korean).

Member Lay as a soloist has XBACK (Xing-Baby-Alliance-Crown-King).

Fall Out Boy: Overcast Kids, a reference to their paid fan club; or Car Crash Hearts, a reference to their song "Thriller" (about their rise to fame); or, more recently, Youngbloods (after the Youngblood Chronicles, the series of music videos they released for the songs on the album Save Rock and Roll).

Elton John: Rockets, after his hit "Rocket Man", and on-again-off-again boutique label since The '70s, Rocket Records.note His official fan club as mentioned on his website is referred to as "The Rocket Club", and "Team Rocket" is an often-used term for them as well.

Juliet Simms: Snakeys. In turn, Juliet Simms is affectionately called "Mama Snake" by her fans.

Marina & the Diamonds: Diamondsnote This is actually the idea behind the name of the act, which despite what it sounds like, does not refer to her backup band (she's a solo act). From Marina herself: "I'm Marina, and you're the Diamonds."

For the Pythagoras Productions units: Idol unit Marginal #4's fans are "Starclusters", their senpai idol unit Lagrange Point has their "LagJuliet Princesses", and their kouhai unit Unicorn Jr. has their "UniMates". This goes for in and out of universe.

Later turned into "the BROKEN Brotherhood" during his #BROKEN persona run in TNA; then changed into "WOKEN Warriors" upon his return and erstwhile reboot of the same persona in his current run in the WWE.

WWE seems dead set on branding fans of the promotion in general as, collectively, "The WWE Universe." The effort the announcers and wrestlers put into shilling the new name makes it seem forced and unnatural in their dialogue.

Internet-using wrestling fans in general have been called "the IWC," or "Internet Wrestling Community."

Progress Wrestling call their fans Progress Ultras. A nickname given to the Progress fans by co-owner Jim Smallman, derived from fanatical and vocal football fans known as Ultras.

"Guardians Of The Galaxy" for Nikki Storm.

Puppet Shows

A common nickname for fans of The Muppets is "Muppet Freaks;" while this is commonly accepted by longtime fans, relatively newer fans (or longtime fans who are new to the fandom itself) tend to find the name to be a tad offensive if they're unaware of what it actually means.

Radio

Dittoheads: Fans of the Rush Limbaugh Talk radio show, coined from callers' tendency to say "Dittos" as a greeting to the host, which originated from one caller who said that instead of spending valuable airtime praising the show and the host, she would simply "ditto what the previous caller said" - at first used derisively by those who assumed it simply meant blind agreement with the host, but openly embraced by the fans.

Fans of British radio star Terry Wogan are either TOGs (Terry's Old Geezers/Gals) or TYGs (Terry's Young Guys/Girls). There are also a number of other terms no longer in widespread use, such as TWITs (Terry Wogan Is Top).

Australian radio host Philip Adams refers to his listeners as "Gladdies," a reference to a running joke that the only people who listen to his show are little old ladies called Gladys.

Clones: Fans of the Jim Rome sports talk show, spawned from fans and callers' tendency to have similar opinions to each other adn often simply reiterating Rome's given opinon on a topic.

Cabin Crew or Fandot: Fans of the BBC series CabinPressure, which is about a tiny charter airline called MJN Air. The "fandot" references Carolyn Knapp-Shappey's line "I don't have an airline. I have one jet. You cannot put one jet in a line. If MJN is anything, it is an airdot."

Dementoids and Dementites: Fans of the Dr. Demento show, used by Dr. Demento himself (although he's also known to reverse the order [i.e., "Dementites and Dementoids"]).

Pests: fans of Opie & Anthony. The collective of the hosts, crew members, regular guests and fans are also referred to as the Virus.

Brazil's football teams have a few besides the ultras: among others, Corinthians is "Bunch of Crazies" (Bando de loucos), Cruzeiro is "Blue China" (China azul), Atlético-MG is "The Mass" (A Massa), and Internacional are "Colorados" (referencing a Spanish word for red).

Izzone: Michigan State Spartansnote Tom Izzo has been the men's head coach since 1995

Oakland Zoo: Pittsburgh Panthersnote Pitt is located in the city's Oakland neighborhood

Orange Krush: Illinois Fighting Illini

O-Zone: Ohio Bobcats

Reed Rowdies: Texas A&M Aggiesnote A&M plays in Reed Arena

The Show: San Diego State Aztecs

Roligans (Denmark national football team: so called because "rolig" is Danish for "calm" or "peaceful," as they are a really good time but are quite nice and not Football Hooligans)

Tartan Army (Scotland national football team; despite the stereotypes of Scots, and much actual hooliganism in Scottish club football, the Tartan Army is actually pretty close to the Roligans in atmosphere)

Beige Brigade (New Zealand, after their beige ODI kits from the early 80s)

Fanatics (Australia)

Swami Army (India)

In Australian Rules Football, commentators often use (Club nickname) or (Club colors) Army. Fremantle Dockers fans are a little more creative, with "Purple Haze".

The fandom and personnel of Roller Derby are collectively known as the "Derbyverse."

Tabletop Games

Long-time wargame hobbyists, especially those with a high tolerance for complexity and a fondness for "monster" games from the 1970s and 1980s, call themselves "grognards."

While fans of Ravenloft can't seem to agree on a collective name for themselves, the team of fanzine writers called "The Kargatane" deserve a mention, for naming themselves after the in-game brainwashed mooks of the Kargat: a secret police force for which Ravenloft's original TSR design team was nicknamed.

Wahams for Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000

Fans of the Ork Faction of Warhammer have been known to call themselves "Nobz," "Gitz," or simply, "Da Boyz," which are all terms for groups of orkish individuals in the game.

"Vidmasters" for Marathon fans. The term originally referred to people who could beat every level on the hardest difficulty with only the starting equipment and without saving. Sometimes, "Spazeroid" is used for fans who are not very good at the game, but it didn't catch on as much.

Sony fans are called the PlayStation Nation by SCE, and a number of less respectable names by detractors ("Sonyggers" being one of the most well-known, but "Ponies" or "Sony Ponies" is also a more politically-correct alternative).

Undertale fans have begun to refer to themselves as "Undertale Trash" or just Trash.

Halo fans are often referred to as SPARTANs, or ODSTs (often leading to discussions on which one is more badass).

LittleBigPlanet fans (or more accurately, Creators) are called Gadders or LittleBigPlanetians.

Yo-Kai Watch fans are called Yokites by Whisper's voice actor, Joey D'Auria. Sometimes they are also called Yo-kai Watchers.

In a rare genre-wide example, fans (and especially competitive players) of Fighting Games are collectively known as the FGC (short for Fighting Game Community). The genre-wide label comes from the fact that the scene started in the arcades and players tended to play more than one game.

Fans of The Idolmaster series are called Producers. It's also not uncommon for someone to note they are a (Character Name)P as a means of indicating a favorite.

The Warframe community are referred to as "Tenno" by the devs. The community itself adopted "Registered Losers" as a nickname after a gaffe from Community Director Rebecca Ford had her mix up the word "users" with "losers" during an interview.

Although the name has stopped being used quite as much, fans of Erfworld still refer to themselves and each other as "Idiots" on occasion: For reference, it's because when discussing the comic on another forum, someone stated something to the affect of: "Only an idiot could like this!", thus giving us a Real Life example of Insult Backfire. At the authors' request, the fans were subsequently called Tools for a time.

The Capitalist Army is the most popular term for fans of True Capitalist Radio, though they've gone by other names (usually based on the thingsGhost calls them, i.e. Fruity-Ass Fruitbowls, Milky-Lickers, Hambones, etc.).

Fans of The Creatures are usually referred to as 'Critters' or 'Creature Cats'.

Most members of the group themselves avert this thinking it's silly to name fanbases. Nova's fans jokingly call themselves the "Anal Army", further mocking it though some fans have now began using the name to legitimately refer to the fanbase.

Smogonites often deride members of another Pokémon fansite, Serebii.net (its owner is infamous for trying to start fights between his site and other Pokémon communities, and pretty much everyone else), as "'Biitards".

"Fans" of the Imageboard4chan have names depending on which of the boards they prefer to post. To name a handful -

/a/ is for /a/ssholes, wee/a/boos, and recently /a/utists.

/b/ is for /b/tards, /b/astards, /b/rothers, /b/rethren, /b/edophiles, /b/ronies (if they happen to be fans of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic) and others. They stick, and depends on the situation.

/c/ is for /c/itizens

/cgl/ frequenters are "seagulls".

/cm/ is for /cm/whores (camwhores)

/co/ is for /co/mrades

/d/ is for /d/eviants

/fa/ is for /fa/ggots

/fit/ is for mis/fit/s

Or /fit/izens.

/g/ is for /g/eeks

/jp/ is for /jp/sies

/k/ is for /k/ommandos

or fuc/k/ers

/i/ is for either art/i/sts or /i/nsurgents, depending on which /i/ you are. (/i/ is either oekaki or invasion.)

Something Awful forum members call themselves "Goons", both on and off the site (e.g. "Goon-con", "Goonfleet" in EVE Online).

Inside Pulse forum members are usually referred to as "Insyders" when they're referenced on the main site. Member Cash Kerouac objected to this, feeling it silly and jargonish; thus, he's usually referred to as an "Outsyder."

The textboard 2channel (not to be confused with Futaba, aka "2chan" to English speakers) is the Japanese cousin of 4chan, and like 4chan have different nicknames for users of different subforums. The most famous is "VIPPER" (in all caps) for frequenters of the "VIP" subforum, 2channel's equivalent of /b/. A user of 2channel in general is called "neller" ("ねらー"), short for "2channeller."

Jacksfilms's fans are known as "biches"note Pronounced with a middle-eastern "ack" sound in place of the "ch" because of the lack of a T., thanks to this entry in the very first episode of "Your Grammar Sucks". Obviously Played for Laughs, and it's easily been a Running Gag ever since then, because people seem to be prone to misspelling it like that. A lot.

On more than one occasion, the Game Grumps have referred to their fans as "Grumplings". However it's not clear if this is an "official" name, per se.

They also parodied this trope by openly trying to think of an appropriate name for their community during one of their Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) videos. Arin comes up with the Lovelies. Jon comes up with the Cumfaggots.

Since Danny took over on the show, he has referred to fans as Lovelies several times. Additionally, on their sister show Steam Train, they have adopted the name Passengers for their fans.

The Grumps have also referred to fans of a particular group or subculture as "X Grumps." An example is when Arin and Danny were talking about cheerleaders and they mention "Cheerleader Grumps."

Commander Holly, wife of Ross lovingly calls her fans "Tweet-hearts" due to her love of birds.

They've also taken on the "9-Year Olds" name after Twitch Streamer Allinity called them that.note Although she used the term to attack the fanbase, the fanbase has used it as a badge of honor thanks to Memetic Mutation.

Expanding on that, we have Kataangers (fans of Katara/Aang, or "Kataang") and their rival shippers, Zutarians (Zuko/Katara, or "Zutara")

And Tokkaneers for fans of Toph/Sokka. Rival shippers of Suki/Sokka never found a good name, but a number have adopted Sukkateer. Georgians has also occasionally been used by Sukka fans (from the meme where any Portmanteau Couple Name sounded too much like either "Sokka" or "Suki", so they gave up and agreed to call the couple "George.")

My Little Pony fans, pre-FiM, often go by PegaSis or Filly. Though it hasn't quite been decided what a male fan would be called, though some identify as "Big Brother (Pony)".

Total Drama voice actor Christian Potenza lovingly calls the show's fans "campers", and greets them thusly at the start of his YouTube videos.note "Campers" is what the contestants were called in the first season, set in a derelict summer camp, which is how the term became identified with the show.

Dandom (Dan Vs.) There's yet to be a widely-used name for the fans themselves, however.

This can be expanded to fans of certain characters by taking the character's name and adding -phile. Exceptions: It's "Gadgephile" without the t, it's "Foxyphile", and it's often "Chipperphile" because "Chipphile" doesn't sound as good.

"Randroids," a term that those who follow Ayn Rand's objectivist philosophy find objectionable, for obvious and not-so-obvious reasons.

Advice columnist and activist Dan Savage calls his fans his "Flying Monkeys," particularly when he's siccing them on someone. The name comes from The Wizard of Oz and his love of musical theater. He once got a bit miffed when an interviewer misheard him and referred to them as his "Blind Monkeys."

Often work in conjunction with the Helenaists, fans of actor Ralph Fiennes are known as Fiennists, a self-dub which originated on Tumblr.

Fans of the Minnesota Rollergirls All-Stars are the Aquaman Army after a misunderstanding of the names of the team colors (Aqua and Army).

"Cumberbitches" for (usually female) fans of Benedict Cumberbatch. In interviews, he seems somewhat embarrassed by this — on the Graham Norton Show, he tried to lie that it was "the Cumber Collective" and Chris Pine had to say it for him.. So are quite a few of his fans, which is why "Benaddicts", "Cumberbabes" and "Cumbercookies" (since all together they make a "Cumberbatch") are becoming increasingly popular.

"Malcoholics" for fans of Malcolm McDowell. especially for females that admire his looks and works, even if it's bad. It is also a play on the term "malcoholic", a person who enjoys violence and do bad stuff. Malcolm is often know to play complex, rutheless and violent characters, so it fits well with the name. Nickname is often used on Tumblr.

A nickname for listeners of The Brewing Network evolved from the listeners themselves, who call themselves "The BN Army".

"Martinis" for fans of Martin Milner.

Railroad enthusiasts are called "Railfans" in the US and "Train Spotters" in the UK. A derogatory term used by actual railroad workers or railfans to describe the more obsessive members of the group is "foamers" in the US (because just the sight of a train will apparently make them foam at the mouth) and F.R.N.s (Fucking Rail Nuts) in the UK.

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